by Wendy Boswell
All of us have gone to a search engine and typed in a query, crossing our fingers that the Search Engine Powers will magically know EXACTLY what we mean when we say “needlepoint hat cheese Chicago.” Unfortunately, search engines and directories do not have extrasensory powers of perception, but fortunately, that’s where search engine helpers come in.
What are “search helpers”?
Think of search helpers as the hamburger in the popular (at least in my house) Hamburger Helper pre-packaged dinners. You have to add hamburger in order to make the dinner taste good and come out the way it’s supposed to; if you didn’t, you’d get a weird mishmash of seasoning and crunchy pasta. Search helpers are a search engine’s hamburger – once you add them, the search results casserole smells good, looks tasty, and won’t go bad in the fridge.
Top Twenty Search Helpers
All of these search helpers have been diligently tested by a team of crack search engine scientists working in an underground lab in…well, actually, no, but I’ve put them through their paces in four different search engines: Google, Yahoo, MSN Search, and Ask Jeeves. Unless otherwise noted, these search helpers will work with the four search engines I focus on in this article. Don’t be afraid to mix up these search helpers. See what combinations you can come up with; they might not always work the way you’d hoped, but you might come up with something new and unique. When you’re done reading the long version of the Top Twenty Search Helpers, you can print out this Web Search Cheat Sheet [PDF] for a handy Internet reference.
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"cheese doodles" tells the search engine to match both of these words, “cheese” and “doodles, ” and to make sure that they are searched for as a phrase. sponge –bob (notice that there’s a space after the first word and before the minus sign). Toy Story +2. search engines index * of the web (it’s a fraction or portion). Works well in all but AskJeeves. site:websearch.about.com "invisible web" will return all results from the web address websearch.about.com for the Invisible Web. link:http://www.lifehacker.com OR link:http://lifehacker. AskJeeves: not supported Google: link:http://www.lifehacker.com OR link:http://lifehacker. MSN Search: link:http://lifehacker.com OR link:http://www.lifehacker. www.lifehacker.com -site:www.lifehacker.com . This shows you all the pages actually linking to Lifehacker, minus the pages within its own domain. cache:google.zoology filetype:ppt zoology filetype:ppt title:Nike allintitle:nike intitle:nike intitle:nike inurl:chewbacca allinurl: chewbacca OR inurl: chewbacca inurl: chewbacca inurl: chewbacca site:.edu herbivorous plants (must take out the period before the “edu” in MSN)site:.org celebrity charity auction site:.gov "civil war" archives macromedia dreamweaver betweendate:200508,200510 Google: macromedia dreamweaver daterange:200508-200510 define:cornucopia define cornucopia define: cornucopia definition: cornucopia quote nkesa (insert your own stock symbol) to any of the four and you’ll get an instant stock quote. site:.br "Rio de Janeiro" convert 45 Celsius to Fahrenheit 45 Celsius in Fahrenheit convert 45 Celsius to Fahrenheit 45 Celsius in Fahrenheit 4*(12-6/3) United 45 or Alaska Airlines 63 . Not supported at MSN Search. gas 97110 (insert your own zip code)weather 97110 (insert your own zip code). Works in all four search engines. All of the above profiled search helpers will save you time and energy when you’re really looking for something (and there’s a ton more search helpers out there!), but here are a couple more tips that can save you some work right out of the gate:
Be specific, be concise, and be precise. Kind of redundant there, but it’s worth repeating (aren’t I punny?). The more words you type in for a query, the more narrowed your search. Case in point: the query bead got over 10 million results in Google, but silver beaded swarovski tassel bracelet size 2 got around 21,000.
Use the right search engine for the right search. There are a ton of highly specialized search engines out there, some of which I’ve profiled: A to Z Search Engines and Directories, 100 Search Engines in 100 Days, Multimedia Searching, etc. So many people go straight to the well-known search engines, and while that’s totally fine, you might just want to check out some of these niche, or vertical, search engines as well.
Put RSS and alerts to work for you. Most major search engines have alert services available that you can personalize to come to you every time there’s any kind of blip on your particular topic; here’s the four profiled in this article: Google Alerts Yahoo Alerts MSN Search Alerts AskJeeves has Bloglines, where you can collate all your subscribed searches, feeds, keyword alerts, etc.
In addition, most sites nowadays have RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, enabled. This means that once you subscribe to the feed using a feed reader such as Bloglines, etc., the content comes to you.
Don’t stop at just search engines. Search engines are not even close to indexing the entire Web, and while these search helpers will help you narrow down your search, there are other ways to find what you may be looking for. Check out specific research and reference sites, look for discussion groups and message boards, the Invisible Web or sort through blogs to find more information about your topic. Be bold in your search adventures – and maybe you’ll end up where no searcher has gone before.
Download a Web Search Cheat Sheet PDF file of these top 20 search engine helpers in a handy table format.
Wendy Boswell edits About.com’s Web Search section.
